Let’s go back over the issue of having too much stuff in our booths. I have two anecdotes that I hope will encourage you to pare down your offerings.
A few years ago, I browsed another jewelry artist’s case. Barbara Sperling does polymer clay canework, which means once she makes a cane design, she can take dozens and dozens of slices from it to make jewelry. (Barbara also happens to be one of the nicest and most professional craftspeople in the industry, so if you see her at a craft fair, BUY HER STUFF!)
I tend to be one of those people who looks for the “perfect one” whenever I have a pile of things to look at. I love to paw through baskets of earrings and piles of bracelets looking for “just the right one.” Oddly, usually I can’t find the one I’m looking for. (More on that below.)
Barbara was a step ahead of a shopper like me.
She had limited the choices in her display severely.
Instead of displaying every single piece she’d made, she’d set up a square panel of black velvet, perhaps 2-4 to a case, with only one or two samples of each design for each jewelry item. For example, in her Great Blue Heron design (my favorite!) she had ONE fancy pendant necklace, ONE simple pendant necklace, TWO pairs of earrings (one large, one small) and a pin.
It was not “sparse”. There was still plenty of jewelry to look at.
But it was focused.
My attention was caught. I zoomed in on the earrings, and I quickly selected a pair.
As I did, two thoughts went through my brain.
1) “Wow! She only has two pairs of heron earrings left. I better snag a pair before she sells them to someone else!!”
2) “I like THIS pair best!”
After I’d paid for my purchase and was on my way back to my booth, I remembered something, and turned back…
Just in time to see Barbara quickly replacing the earrings I’d just bought with another pair!
She had tons of those heron earrings, all subtly different. She had them stashed away behind the counter, ready to quickly replenish any stock as it sold.
She could have put out dozens of heron earrings, and saved herself the trouble.
But choosing from dozens would have been overwhelmed me. Flooded me. Left me unable to choose.
In fact, for some people, this feeling is so uncomfortable they will not stay in a booth that has too much stuff–especially if it’s a lot of similar stuff.
So our first corollary is:
Choosing from many is hard. Choosing “the best of two or three” is easy.
My second anecdote is simply an observation I’ve made from watching people browse my booth. I especially noticed this when I did a 600 square foot sales/demo booth at the League of NH Craftsmen’s Fair three years ago. I had over 30 feet of “aisle footage”, and that’s a long time for people to be walking by your booth.
I had several jewelry and sculpture displays along the walkway, and several places people could enter the booth. (ALWAYS leave plenty of space for people to come in and mill around.) As people strolled by, something would catches their eye.
Intrigued, they’d step up for a closer look. Then they’d come in and start browsing in earnest. Finally, they’d decide they were seriously looking for “their piece.”
Now, some knew what that was. But others had a harder time.
When the people having a harder time were ready for help–when they indicated they LOVED the work, wanted to purchase something, but they couldn’t make up their mind–I’d ask them a very simple question:
“What was the first piece you touched when you came in my booth?”
People, I swear to you….99 times out of 100, that is the piece they end up buying.
One woman protested, “But I literally just put out my hand and touched it. I didn’t really even look at it!”
But in the end, it was still the necklace she chose to buy, after insisting at looking at dozens and dozens of similar pieces. (I know, because I pulled each and every one of those pieces.)
Here’s my theory:
Our heart knows which item speaks to us.
Sometimes it’s even the first piece that catches our eye. (Our brains are actually super-processors of date. We’re hard-wired to notice the cheetah’s outline amidst the leaves in the forest jungle. We really can pick out that lovely turquoise-accented necklace from a myriad of pale blue ones….)
Our heart gives a little leap and says, “That’s the one!” Our hand goes out to the item, and we touch it (or wish we could, if it’s under glass or signs say “please don’t touch.”)
Then our busy brains kick in. “Wait, there might be something better!” it cajoles. “Let’s go look at everything so we’re sure we’re getting the nicest one!”
Or we agonize about whether it will go with our clothes. Or if it’s too fancy to wear for every day. Or if it’s too different than the kind of thing we usually buy.
We are afraid of making the wrong choice. And so we choose nothing.
That’s when your customer says those dreaded words: “I’ll be back.”
You’ve lost them. Only one in a hundred people will work their way back to you. There’s just too much going on at a good show, too many other wonderful distractions.
Our jobs as sellers is to encourage people to trust their heart. To trust the choice that comes from their unconscious yearnings.
Because that is the choice that will stay with them, and give them the most joy in the years ahead.
I now do this myself when I shop. Sometimes I’m wrong, but not as often as you might think. And it frees me up to do more shopping in more booths, too!
So try acting on this corollary:
You touch it, it owns YOU!
Be gentle, be subtle, and don’t force it.
See if it doesn’t help those indecisive customers get to their happy place faster.
Luann Udell 